Don't get concerned if the Results page is confusing with its rows of numbers. For each person tested, the row of numbers represents that person’s DNA “barcode.” Each number in the row reflects the number of times a particular sequence occurs at a location on the Y chromosome. These locations are called DNA Y-Chromosome Segments and each DYS is assigned a serial number. For example, one of these locations is called DYS 449. These DYS values, called repeats, are important in determining the closeness of our paternal line VICK relationships.

In addition to the posted results there are members awaiting initial results. Many others are considering joining. This is out of what we estimate to be a few thousand living VICK-surnamed male descendants of Joseph VICK plus perhaps a few thousand more who are descended from other VICK ancestors.

We have three major branches of the tree of humanity in our project. These branches are called haplogroups. Even though project members may have the same surname, if they don’t share the same haplogroup they don’t share a common ancestor within the last 10,000 years or more.

The results essentially mean (1) those in the upper group (with haplogroup "Q" in the 3rd column) are “closely related” to each other even though they may be as distant as 8th cousins and may not have a paper trail or even the same last name, (2) those below this group are in a different haplogroup and are not “closely related” to those in the haplogroup Q, and (3) those in the lower groups are more closely related to each other than to the upper group but still not within thousands of years except for A. Stanley and Franklin who are close cousins.

You may notice that we have no participation from variants of the name VICK except for Roger whose ancestry includes a WICK and William who is a WICKS. This is due to the fact that VICK, although relatively uncommon, is one of the most common of the variant names. We are looking for new project members with variant surnames.

Haplogroup Q is very rare in Europeans. The haplogroup Q VICKs are all descended from a Joseph VICK who immigrated about 1670. Some cirumstances suggest Joseph1 coming from Gloucestershire, England, but cannot be proven with any solid evidence. What his earlier family history is cannot be determined at this time. Dr. Stephen Oppenheimer of Oxford University has said that Joseph’s first ancestor in the British Isles was most likely an invader from northern Norway and ultimately from Asia.

Other ideas are that English VICKs originated from Huguenot immigrants to England from the French persecution of the 1500s, were imported into England by the King as tradesmen in the 1300s from Germany or France, or came as Roman settlers as early as 100 AD, in addition to the hap Q VICKs’ probable Nordic connection.

Regarding the men listed with the haplogroup Q VICKs who have other surnames, we know that Bill and Jennings are 2nd cousins. We also suspect Mr. SHAW may be mainly of African ancestry. The reasons for these results may be name changes, adoptions, etc. Regarding VICK relatives of mainly African American ancestry a likely connection is slavery. The descendants of Joseph VICK were mainly southerners. Many VICK families owned slaves. One branch of the family even had "white" family members killed by the Nat TURNER slave revolt of 1831 in Virginia.

Another common theme in VICK history is connections to American Indians. We can say with a high degree of confidence that none of the current members had Indian VICK paternal ancestry. But many VICKs have a family history which includes Indian ancestry on other than the strictly male line.

Feel free to discuss this project on the Vick-YDNA-Genealogy Yahoo group or Vick Family Forum. Note - there is no link on the forum page to get back here so use your back button on the upper left.